Hugh Walpole

Katherine Christine

Warsaw 2019

Contents

PART I

THE KING OF STUTTERS

NICHOLAS HERRIES IN HIS HOME

THE MAGICIAN AND HIS LITTLE DAUGHTER

MUSTER OF HERRIES

KATHERINE: BIRTHDAY REMINISCENCE

TWO HALVES OF THE POISONED APPLE

THE LAKE

‘THE PEACOCK HAS FLOWN’

BIRTH OF AN IMPORTANT MEMBER OF THE HERRIES FAMILY

PART II

DEDICATION OF THE HEART

THIS MY MASTER

THE FLAMES ARE HIDDEN

PORTRAIT OF THE KING

KATHERINE AT SEDDON

PETER AND HIS CONFESSION

LUCY IN CUMBERLAND

THE MOON IS DARKENED

NICHOLAS SEES THE SUN

PART III

KINSMEN AT WAR

THE BETRAYAL

THE BETRAYED

THE ROCKS

CROMWELL: FLAME AND CLOUD

BRAVE BANNERS AT MALLORY

PART I

THE KING OF STUTTERS

NICHOLAS HERRIES IN HIS HOME

Robert Herries looked up, staggered to his feet and, chuckling, started across the floor towards his father.

Nicholas Herries, his father, and Rosamund Herries, his mother, looked at him with love and pride. Nicholas, a vast man, was in this year 1603 fifty-nine years of age and his wife thirty-seven.

They were in their own house at Westminster and all was very well with them. Robert, their only child, was now three years of age. In build he was broad and well-formed but short, his sturdy legs strong on the ground, his round head well set on his thick neck, his eyes steady and piercing.

He was still a baby but already he had self-confidence and independence. He was a grave baby now: he chuckled only when his father was at hand. Everything that was told to him, the rhymes that his mother sang to him, the cautions and admonitions that Mrs. Margit, his nurse, gave to him–all these he took in and remembered.

Already it was facts that he liked the best; his mind wandered at fairy-stories. Any tale that he was told must be well substantiated. That was perhaps the reason that his father meant more to him than any other in his world, for there was no doubt or question about his father, so large was he and solid, so strong in the arm, and when he held his son against his breast the thumping of his heart was like the reassurance of a great beating drum.

Already Robert felt safe against any sort of peril if his father were there. But he was not in any case a nervous baby and he had already a firm preponderance of the Herries matter-of-fact common sense. Facts indeed were facts and it was already his rule of life to go by what you could see, feel, hold and even seize. And what he seized he held. At this present he was holding what was just then his favourite possession–a Fool with silver bells, a red cap and a great hooked nose. As he crossed the shining parlour floor to his father he held the Fool tightly in his chubby fist and the bells carolled gaily.

Nicholas had been almost asleep, for he had had a hard day that had included a visit to the Queen. Then the fire was blazing finely in the open hearth, throwing its erratic lights on the colours of dark green, gold, and brilliant blue that Rosamund was working into her tapestry.

Nicholas had been almost dreaming–dreaming about his long life and the principal scenes in it, of the girl Catherine he had loved who had given her life for him, of his dear brother Robin who had been tortured to his death in the Tower, and after that of England that he loved so dearly. He had come to full awareness with a start, crying: “England is a lovely place: I would have no other.’ And then, realizing his son, he had stretched out his great arms: “Come, Robin–come!’

At once Robin had started across the floor. They had given him this pet name after his beloved uncle, but he did not hesitate, as his uncle would have done, seeing both sides of the argument. He saw only one–that he liked above all things his father’s arms, their warmth and strength and perfect safety.

So he started at once across the floor, the red-capped Fool, with his proud nose, held captive in his fist.

Nicholas picked him up, carried him to his mother who kissed him, then he took him from the room high on his shoulder.

Later Nicholas returned and stood, his legs spread, warming his back before the fire. Rosamund asked him about the Queen.

“She can live but a little time. Indeed she is already dead. That old woman, seated on the floor rolling her head from side to side, is nothing. Her greatness has flown to the skies where it belongs for all time.’

“And so it will be James of Scotland.’

“Yes. They say strange things of him. He is a scholar, a great Latinist, but has superstitions like an old dame of the village. He is resolute and unresolute. Avaricious and generous. And his moralities–’

“His moralities?’ she asked, laughing up at him.

“Are not for ladies’ ears.’

She gathered up her tapestry.

“I must go to Robin.’ As she passed him she kissed his cheek–”Ladies’ ears have a wider compass than men can fancy. I have heard–this and that.’

In the early morning of March 24th, he was lying in the big four-poster with his wife and very fast asleep. He woke as though someone had tapped him on the shoulder. Rosamund’s hand was lightly on his left breast and, very gently, he removed it. What had disturbed him? Moving his big body with great care lest he should rouse her, he sat up and listened.

There was no sound except the wind teasing outside the window. He stayed there, bothered by the little worrying thoughts that come to every wakeful man in the middle of the night–thoughts about Mallory, a new gardener he had who was one of these Puritans, always preaching to the other servants and rebuking them for pleasures that seemed to Nicholas most natural and wholesome, thoughts about moneys and whether he should buy those two new fields towards the far paddock–but thoughts especially about the plague. There were signs already that it would be returning this summer and, if a hot summer, it would be a bad case. Had he better now, before April, move with Rosamund and Robin to Mallory? There was nothing to keep him in the town, and although he loved his Westminster house, he loved Mallory yet more. He thought of a play that he had seen three nights back by that bawdy fellow Ben Jonson, and then, with that, the bore that a week ago at dinner Lord Henry Howard had been with his long-drawn-out complaint against the fellow because Jonson had struck one of his servants.

He stretched his arms and yawned. He scratched his chest. None of these was the real matter. There was something further. He dropped his naked feet on to the floor, stood up and moved gingerly to where was his furred gown. He turned and listened. Rosamund slept sweetly. Moving with great gentleness for so vast a man, yawning again and scratching his head, he unlatched the door and crossed into the little room where he kept his large globe and his maps. Like every gentleman of his time he was deeply interested in the foreign adventures of his countrymen. There had been a time when, with Armstrong, he had thought to be one of those adventurers. He stood there, his fur gown caught closely about him, for it was chill, lit a candle on a silver candlestick and stayed, twisting the globe with his finger. What was it that had brought him out of his bed? Then he was aware, or thought that he was aware, of a keener chill than the March air could provide. He put his hand inside the fur and closed it on his breast. He felt a quite frantic beating of his heart and the flesh within his hand was dank with a sweat.

It could not be that he was afraid, he who had never been afraid in his life save once when he had struck Armstrong in the face. And yet beneath his gown he felt that his knees were trembling. He stared beyond the globe that was golden in the wavering candle-light, out to the latticed window. The curtains were not drawn and he could see the clouds racing across the sky. Clouds swollen and black, and one of them that seemed to stay opposite the window had the face of an angry pig.

His heart hammered and stopped. His nails gritted on the wooden surface of the globe, for there was a shadow steadily gathering before the window, a shadow so thin that it was like a man’s breath. His gown slipped behind his neck leaving the top part of his back bare, but he did not put his hand to it. He was held where he stood, for, in the uncertain light of the candle, it seemed to him that the vaporous air was forming a figure. Staring, his mind running ahead of belief, he saw the figure gather. Very, very thin it was, and the window and the night clouds could be clearly seen behind it, but all the body could be traced, the slim shoulders, the haunches, the thighs, and then the face–the face that he so dearly loved, that he thought of so many times, and about it he would say to Rosamund: “Do you remember how his eyes were, how beautiful they were, and his mouth when he smiled...?’

It seemed to him that that mouth smiled now. His gown fell off him and lay about his feet but he did not know it. He said one word: “Robin!’ He waited. Then he repeated: “Robin! Oh, dear Robin!’ He heard, very thinly but in the old beloved tone:

“Nick–the Queen is dead. The Queen is dead, Nick!’

“Stay–Robin...’ He moved forward, his legs catching in the tumbled gown. He was no longer afraid, love had killed fear.

But there was nothing to be seen–only the window and the black cold clouds.

He bent down and picked up the gown, wrapping it about him. He did not know whether it was Robin that he had seen, but he did know, beyond any kind of doubt, that the Queen was dead.

It was true enough, and on the next morning Nicholas, as did the whole country with him, relaxed.

Elizabeth had been a grand experience for her countrymen, who, however, had never known from one day to another what the next event might be. She had been always unexpected. The only two sure expectations concerning her–that she would be either assassinated or married–had both been disappointed. Through these expectations, however, the thought of her had always been interesting. Now there were no expectations any more!

Nicholas, walking through Whitehall that morning, felt quite suddenly that he himself had become a trifle dull. The vision of his brother, hallucination or no, had moved him extraordinarily, and it appeared to him now, in the cold March air, that with the withdrawal of Elizabeth part of himself had also been withdrawn and that Robin had wished to tell him that.

It was as though Robin had said to him: “Nothing stays still. Your Queen is dead and your life as an active participant is over. You have now a duller rôle to play.’

He felt dull. He went to play tennis with Monteagle who had curious, amusing, very bawdy tales to tell about the new King. He told him also some interesting things about the Gowrie Plot of three years earlier. Here Nicholas had a family excitement, for a cousin of his, Sir Hugh Herries, had been in the room–one of a crowd of Scottish gentlemen. It had been considered that young Ruthven had fathered the Queen’s, Anne of Denmark’s, children–or one of them at the least. And that James had rid himself of the brothers with this Pot of Gold imbroglio. At any rate, Monteagle avowed, James had never felt any passion for any woman.

“It is a pity, Herries,’ Monteagle said, laughing and looking at Nicholas’ superb figure in his playing-shirt and tight drawers, “that you are not thirty years younger. There would be a fine place at Court for you.’

And Nicholas, like any other Elizabethan gentleman, thinking little of such matters, hit the ball lustily and swore a grotesque oath.

Nicholas was present with the crowd at Theobalds the night before King James entered London.

It was a superb sight. All the nobility of England and Scotland were there, riding into the First Great Court. Here all dismounted save the King. Then four nobles stepped to his horse, two before, two behind, and brought him forward into the Second Great Court. Then he himself (and very clumsily as Nicholas saw) dismounted. A young man presented a petition which the King graciously received. Then he came forward into the heart of the Court and there were the great men of England ready to receive him. Here was his real reception as King of England. Here were Chancellor Egerton, Treasurer Buckhurst, and Nicholas’ boring and malicious, spiteful friend Henry Howard, Privy Seal.

But the man who caught the eye was none of these but rather Secretary Robert Cecil, master of that house and indeed of all England.

Nicholas had often seen Cecil before and always marvelled at the power and presence there was in that deformed little body. There was something terrifying about Cecil. How men shouted and cheered at that meeting of Cecil and the King! It signified the reality of the bond between Scotland and England. Nicholas himself made a tremendous noise and there were tears in his eyes, for he was a sentimental man and easily moved.

They passed into the house and very odd they looked–the deformed Cecil and the loutish awkward King.

Nicholas had, with good fortune, been standing near to them and he saw the King look at him, for, with his great height and breadth of shoulder, he towered above the rest. Nicholas was a loyalist of the loyalists and would always be, but he could not deny that a strange stale odour came from the King as of manure and mice and straw. Nicholas did not give bodily odours an especial thought–many ladies he had loved had smelt strongly–but this odour of the King’s was something peculiar and he was never to forget it. For the rest he got a good notion of the King’s physical properties. Middle height and perhaps well-set, inclining to stoutness, but this was difficult to say because of the famous quilted doublet and stuffed breeches that he wore for fear of a dagger-thrust.

When he ambled in with Cecil he waddled like a duck and his stuffed behind stuck backwards like a separate entity. Nevertheless the face was not that of a fool nor was it unpleasant: he had large prominent blue eyes and they stared at the person with whom he talked as though he would read all the secrets. His cheeks were high-coloured and healthy, his hair brown and his beard thin and scattered. Nicholas had the impression that he would see into men’s hearts and minds more ably than they would see into his. Strangest of all, he reminded him, at the last, of his tragic and all-daring mother. While the trumpets blew and the nobles cheered, Nicholas remembered a moment when he had seen Mary on the steps of Chartley waiting for her horse to be brought. This King had both his mother and his weak father, Darnley, in his blood.

At the beginning of May, Nicholas went down to Mallory with his wife and child that they might avoid the plague.

Once again in his beloved place his energies returned. He was soon seeing to the cattle and the pigs and the garden and the fields and the labourers and the household servants as though he were yet twenty. And Gilbert Armstrong worked beside him as though he were his brother.

Now he gave himself heart and soul to the training of his young son. He was half a century older, there was no escaping from that. And it was of no comfort to tell himself that he had the powers to beget a million children more could he find women to bear them. It was of no use to talk of a million children; here was the matter of one, young Robert Herries. He had first all the surprise of discovering that his son promised in no way to resemble himself, a surprise very common to fathers. To begin with the physical side, Young Robert was short and sturdy and would never be tall. His eyes were steady, unlighted by anger or astonishment. When his father held him naked in his arms the body was strong and well-shaped, but it was not an athlete’s body, as his own had been from the beginning. Nor was it the body of a poet as his uncle Robin’s had been. You could tell these things from the start.

When Nicholas held him thus young Robin did not start nor wriggle. He lay quite still watching his father with his steady eyes. When Nicholas plunged him suddenly into cold water he neither screamed nor cried.

Mrs. Margit, an ugly old woman with bent shoulders and a double chin, but immaculately starched, wearing a high white ruff and a tall white cap, said that Robin was the steadiest child she had ever governed.

“He’s no trouble and no blessing as you might say, Master. If I’m gone or come it makes no odds to him.’

But he loved his father and mother and Armstrong, and above all his father–and yet Nicholas could not but feel that he was something of a joke to him. As the months passed and then 1604 arrived, and then Michaelmas and Christmas, young Robin became ever more baffling. He learned quickly to talk but he did not speak unless he intended. Whether in London or at Mallory he amused himself.

He seemed not to know fear nor any passion violently save one–that of possession. And yet he was not cold-hearted. He loved to walk with his father, Nicholas bending his height, Robin’s tiny hand in his father’s vast one. He would hold on to his mother as though he were terrified that he would lose her.

Yet it seemed to Nicholas that his plans, those that he made privately in his mind, were apart from all of them.

Nicholas taught him all about nature–flowers, the farm, the reason for this and that.

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